Playing 'the game' at work

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ergonomics

ergonomics

ergonomics

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Being young and i guess you could say naive, it's slowly occurring to me that a lot of people play 'the game' at work to keep their job/progress in a company.

I've never really thought much about it, and i like to think everyone should just be as honest and straight forward as possible, but that isn't happening in my experience so far.

After receiving certain feedback from my manager, who had to be as professional as possible, but hinted at me needing to play the game a little more with the top level managers, i am left thinking..

How do you guys play the game at work?
 
If I find myself in that situation I leave the company and go somewhere less retarded.
 
aln said:
If I find myself in that situation I leave the company and go somewhere less retarded.
Click to expand...

That would be great if my company wasn't one of the best places to be for opportunities (and they damn well know that..). They have the whole 'well you get such great opportunities here, we will pay you minimum wage and criticise you'.

I've been criticised for looking too relaxed and easy going - which my manager said is a great trait to have, especially in high pressure situations and dealing with clients, however certain upper management assume i am lazy and not pro-active. I've been told to just 'look busier' and that i am doing my job to a very high standard, but if i dont look busy, people will get the wrong impression.

It's frustrating, but sadly i'm beginning to learn in some industries it's a must..
 
This is why I've never done well in my work, I refuse to play the corporate game. My bitter view and summing up is this...

Employees are judged on number of hours they spend in the office, and not on the actual amount of work they do. Frequently I would see people who I knew didn't do half as much work as me getting promotions just because they turned up half and hour early everyday and left an hour late. On the odd occasions I did need to work late, I'd often walk through the office and see people staying, yet not actually doing anything.

I've seen far too much nepotism in the corporate environment, family members of bosses given jobs and pay-rises often blatantly.

I also refuse to play the entitled staff member, I once worked with a guy who told me he'd go and see the boss once and month and ask for a payrise. My view has always been that my bosses should see how good a worker I am and offer it to me.

I've also never been on to blow my own trumpet to pimp myself. I've always done lots of stuff above and beyond my remit but I don't go running to the boss and say "look what I did", as a result I've always found myself massively appreciated by my colleagues but often overlooked by my bosses.
 
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It's not a game. It's like in your driving test, it's not enough to look in your mirrors, you have to make sure the examiner knows you have done so.

Doesn't sound like "one of the best places" to be to me. It sounds like it's chock-full of lazy managers.

:(
 
I sympathise OP. 3 years ago I took over managing a team when my boss at the time moved on. No pay rise and no promotion but lots of vague promises. At the start of 2012 I even took on yet another team (inc my current one). Still no benefit. Then I finally find out that I am eligible for promotion. All my work feedback is great, my teams have exceeded all objectives and all markers show I have excelled in my role. However, I then find out that there are actually only two criteria that (and I quote my boss here) "really matter". (1) "Who on the senior management team will support you?"and (2) "Your Equality Rating".
When I dug deeper I was essentially told that because I spent all my time delivering on my day job rather than flirting with senior managers (like one of my female colleagues does) or smarming up at every chance I get (as is common), that I struggled to get support. Eventually though I got through that part to find out that the was an equality component which might scupper my promo. Being a white, middle class (really?!), male I was ranked amongst the lowest in that section. I did get eventually promoted but was shocked at the fact that my actual delivery of work counted for almost nothing.
Even worse, my former boss told me about a potential secondment to our Japanese branch and said I should do it. When I told him that I didn't want it due to a new relationship and the fact that I share custody of my 7 year old son and wouldn't get access from Japan, he actually hinted that it might be seen a detrimental to my career for not taking it up. He did back up amazingly quickly when I said that if I ever detected evidence of that I would go to a tribunal immediately.
 
ergonomics said:
That would be great if my company wasn't one of the best places to be for opportunities (and they damn well know that..). They have the whole 'well you get such great opportunities here, we will pay you minimum wage and criticise you'.
Click to expand...

Even if your company is the best place on the plaent for opportunities, that doesn't work for you if they pass you up. When you think it's about time you were ready and should be given a new opportunity, seek it externally if its not on offer to _you_ at your current company.

Lifes all about the company of ergonomics, remember that.
 
aln said:
If I find myself in that situation I leave the company and go somewhere less retarded.
Click to expand...

This ^^^, for me at least.

I've hit the button on taking redundancy because playing the game (i.e. acting like an arse) is not my thing. If you can do it, fair enough, but I think you have to be in the right job in the first place and be in the right company (both organisation and people) for it to be worth 'playing the game'.
 
estebanrey said:
This is why I've never done well in my work, I refuse to play the corporate game. My bitter view and summing up is this...

Employees are judged on number of hours they spend in the office, and not on the actual amount of work they do. Frequently I would see people who I knew didn't do half as much work as me getting promotions just because they turned up half and hour early everyday and left an hour late. On the odd occasions I did need to work late, I'd often walk through the office and see people staying, yet not actually doing anything.

I've seen far too much nepotism in the corporate environment, family members of bosses given jobs and pay-rises often blatantly.

I also refuse to play the entitled staff member, I once worked with a guy who told me he'd go and see the boss once and month and ask for a payrise. My view has always been that my bosses should see how good a worker I am and offer it to me.

I've also never been on to blow my own trumpet to pimp myself. I've always done lots of stuff above and beyond my remit but I don't go running to the boss and say "look what I did", as a result I've always found myself massively appreciated by my colleagues but often overlooked by my bosses.
Click to expand...

My exact feelings. Unfortunately, my urge to succeed is just a big as my refusal for blowing my managers.. so i'm faced with the 'if you cant beat them, join them' idea.

aln said:
Even if your company is the best place on the plaent for opportunities, that doesn't work for you if they pass you up. When you think it's about time you were ready and should be given a new opportunity, seek it externally if its not on offer to _you_ at your current company.

Lifes all about the company of ergonomics, remember that.
Click to expand...

This is true, however i will never encounter the calibre of clients we receive. I'm getting some valuable experience, meeting valuable contacts and working on some impressive projects. I constantly look for opportunities elsewhere, but the further down the foodchain, the less opportunity for high profile clients, and ironically, the less managerial bull id get, and more money..!
 
estebanrey said:
This is why I've never done well in my work, I refuse to play the corporate game. My bitter view and summing up is this...

Employees are judged on number of hours they spend in the office, and not on the actual amount of work they do. Frequently I would see people who I knew didn't do half as much work as me getting promotions just because they turned up half and hour early everyday and left an hour late. On the odd occasions I did need to work late, I'd often walk through the office and see people staying, yet not actually doing anything.

I've seen far too much nepotism in the corporate environment, family members of bosses given jobs and pay-rises often blatantly.

I also refuse to play the entitled staff member, I once worked with a guy who told me he'd go and see the boss once and month and ask for a payrise. My view has always been that my bosses should see how good a worker I am and offer it to me.

I've also never been on to blow my own trumpet to pimp myself. I've always done lost of stuff above and beyond my remit but I don't go running to the boss and say "look what I did", as a result I've always found myself massively appreciated by my colleagues but often overlooked by my bosses.
Click to expand...

There is a lot of what you have mentioned going on in my place too, the "blowing your own trumpet" thing, when the cold hard reality is that those that do the blowing of trumpets seem to do the least amount of work, but make out that they are massively over-worked and underpaid, its soul destroying to watch sometimes.

Its seems to be the sad way that a lot of large corporate companies work, the management only notice the trumpet blowers, not the hard grafters, they also tend to reward the trumpet blowers with salary increases where as the grafters seem to always be left to the sidelines.

Working in a large corporate organisation for the last 8 years has tainted me (maybe not all corporations are not like this), upon reflection its probably better for my sanity to look for alternative work, but reading posts about how hard it is to find new work when people have been made redundant, i keep sticking at the current role, hoping that the next wave of upper management that tends to get wiped out every year or next big take-over will change things for the better, but i think its wishful thinking, as it turns out that its just a new line of management that the trumpet blowers just suck-up-to again, then the cycle repeats again, and again.
 
Happened to me twice recently. Now I am not in a bad job in the first place (NHS Band 7). But recently I've wrote two pieces for the board. One, about security, was lifted in whole and added to an annual report with no credit whatsoever. The second piece I done all the work, some temp comes in and basically uses all my advice to write a proposal to the board, again with no credit). So it seems the way to get ahead is to nick other peoples' work and claim it as your own.

I think in both cases they won't win anyway as I sit next to the MDs and if it gets mentioned I'm comfortable enough to vent my spleen about people nicking my work, but it does strike me that people must make their careers off the back of other's hard work.
 
If you don't ask for a payrise, any company in their right mind won't give you one. Reduce fixed costs and all that.

I've quickly come to believe that companies don't mind in the slightest dicking you around as much as possible for as long as possible, but the moment they want anything from you they want it last week if possible, yesterday at the earliest and if, as I have been recently, you're out of sight then you are most definitely out of mind.

Gone are the days when hard work got rewarded. These days hard work is expected and you get nothing that a company can get away with not giving you. It used to be hard work got you noticed and promoted. These days any promotions in large, corporate companies need to be advertised and interviewed for otherwise someone who doesn't deserve it gets all uppity that they didn't get a chance to apply, even though they'd probably be rubbish at the job or haven't shown any redeeming qualities. you can even encourage anyone if you're remotely connected to the role as this can be seen as favouritism. Sometimes I hate working in a large company and wish I worked in a small company, without 100,000 employees all trying to screw everyone else over to get anywhere.
 
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